


Flicker In The Dark

by WhispersInTheWing



Category: Ghost Adventures (TV)
Genre: Gen, Ghosts, Possession, Present Tense, lockdown - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-01
Updated: 2015-10-01
Packaged: 2018-04-24 08:16:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4912078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhispersInTheWing/pseuds/WhispersInTheWing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zak, Nick and Aaron arrive in Boston Massachusetts to investigate the notoriously haunted Placid Hills hospital and Sanatorium. On the outside it seems somewhat peaceful: Emma Brantley, a girl from England who was sent to Placid Hills to die by her family in the early 1910's and whose life was taken by Oliver Campbell. Oliver Campbell, Emma's first and only love who survived his illness and became a doctor at Placid Hills only to be haunted by Emma through Eleanor Winston. Eleanor Winston, a little girl with an inoperable brain tumor who lost her life and is now searching for her friend.</p><p>But on the inside, the guys find a much darker and more terrifying picture. Oliver Campbell still resides in the hospital, keeping a demonic hold on the other spirits, including Emma. Can Zak help Emma find closure with Eleanor before it's too late? And what happens when Oliver decides he doesn't want the Ghost Adventures crew there?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flicker In The Dark

**Preface:**

I had never given much thought as to how I would die. Trapped in Placid Hills Hospital’s psychiatric ward; it was the only thing I didn’t want to think of. I knew deep down that I would die in this bed, in this cold and damp room. Instead I thought of what I would do after I was free of this place. I thought of the rolling green hills dotted with wildflowers in spring. I thought of spending the holidays with my family; opening gifts on Christmas morning.

My name is Emma Brantley. I turned 16 on February 23rd, 1912 and I celebrated my birthday with 200 other people at Placid Hills. I have been at Placid Hills since my parents shipped me from London to Boston to have me admitted when I was just 12 years old.

No one expected me to live for 4 years in this horrid place. I was not expected to live that long surrounded by disease and death. People died every day, every hour here at Placid Hills. They died from scarlet fever, the plague, tuberculosis, even murder and suicide. And then there was the fire. The fire that destroyed the Children’s Ward and took the lives of 36 innocent children.

I wish I could say my story has a happy ending. But it doesn’t. I wish I could say that I escaped this place and the dark things that happened here. But I didn’t. And I never will.

For those of you who haven’t figured it out yet, I died here at Placid Hills Hospital in May of 1912. But I did not die from disease. I did not commit suicide. I was killed by the one man I had ever trusted in this hospital. My one true love, Oliver Campbell, looked straight into my eyes as he drove the knife straight into my heart. The last thing I saw was tears in his eyes before my world was engulfed in blackness.

**30 Years Later:**

Placid Hills Hospital finally finished construction on its new Children’s Ward. More than 30 years after the tragic fire that claimed the lives of 36 children, young patients are returning here. How I dreamt when I was young that I would one day be free.

You see, I never left Placid Hills. Well not all of me left. My body was transported away a long time ago. After Oliver slayed me, they took my body to the morgue to await shipment back to London. But that never happened. I was buried behind the hospital in an unmarked grave along with about a dozen other bodies.

My spirit has stayed; trapped forever within these walls. I am doomed to walk the halls of this hospital, watching the patients shrivel away and die. Now I will watch these children grow up in the ward; some being able to battle through their disease, others succumbing to the blackness that awaits them in death. It is heartbreaking to see children so young forced into adult situations like terminal disease. If only they knew that I was watching over them.

I wander the hallways of the hospital, looking for him.

 _“Where are you Oliver? You cannot hide from me forever.”_ I thought. Oliver Campbell never left Placid Hills either. But his story is not yet over. Oliver is no longer a patient; he’s a doctor.

Oliver Campbell overcame his tuberculosis three months after my death. He left for medical school in the summer of 1913. I didn’t see him again until he returned in 1919 at the ripe age of 23.

How I loathe him. How I loathe Oliver for ending my life and living his without regret. I show him my hatred every chance I get. Maybe I give a whisper in his ear, or cause a door to close near him. Oliver has no idea it is I who haunts him while he makes his rounds. But soon…very soon I will make myself known to Oliver Campbell.

I pass through the same hallways and rooms as I always have for the past 30 years. They never change, save for the occupants. Oliver should be here any minute. He always checks on the patient in room 2230. It is here that I will show myself to Oliver and he won’t be able to deny what he’ll see.

I watch as Oliver waltzes in. He’s still as arrogant as ever.

“Hello there Eleanor; how are you feeling today?” He asked the small girl lying in the bed. Eleanor Winston was a girl of about 13 who was battling a brain tumor. Her prognosis was grim and the only thing left for the doctors to do was to make her as comfortable as they could until she died. Eleanor turned and looked straight at me for a moment before speaking.

“I’m fine Dr. Campbell. My friend came to see me today. She’s very nice.” Eleanor replied. I knew she was talking about me. It seemed that Eleanor could sense my presence and talked to me when she was alone. I have no idea why she can sense me or hear my voice, but by some strange rare chance she can. We would talk for hours in the night until she drifted off to sleep. Eleanor had no family to visit her in Placid Hills. She was just like me. A cast-off from her family as soon as it was discovered she was sick.

“You had a friend today? What’s her name?” Oliver asked her. Though Oliver was an arrogant man; there was a soft spot in his heart for the children at the hospital. It was the only time he was truly kind and showed compassion.

“Emma.” Eleanor said with a smile. The color began to drain from Oliver’s face.

“W-What’s Emma’s last name Eleanor?” Oliver stuttered. I drifted closer to Eleanor’s bedside. Her eyes flitted to me; a look of hesitation on her face.

 _“Go ahead Ellie. You can tell Dr. Campbell my name. He and I are old friends.”_ I whispered, motioning toward Oliver.

Eleanor turned to look at Oliver again. “Her name is Emma Brantley. She says you and her are old friends. Do you remember her Dr. Campbell?”

The color drained completely from Oliver’s face and he swayed on his feet like he was about to faint. “Why yes I do remember Emma. She died quite a long time ago. How do you know her Eleanor?”

“She’s my friend Dr. Campbell. She comes and visits me every day. We talk all the time. She’s here now Dr. Campbell.” Eleanor pointed in my direction. I smiled.

This was it. The time had finally come to reveal myself to Oliver Campbell. I focused on the energy being generated in the room; gathering it from the various machines and the people in the room. But I didn’t take energy from Eleanor, never from Eleanor. Eleanor needed all of her energy if she was going to stand a chance against the tumor.

When I finally had enough energy built up, I concentrated on making my apparition as clear and solid as possible. My face was serene and calm as I appeared before Oliver. He screamed out and dropped the papers in his hands.

“No, it can’t be! No Emma you can’t be real! This is just my imagination! You can’t be real Emma Brantley!” Oliver shouted crazily.

I spoke as clearly and slowly as I could. _“I am real. I am very real Oliver Campbell. And I have come back to exact my revenge on you. You killed me Oliver and you know this to be true. What do you have to say for yourself?”_

“Get away from me! Leave me alone!” Oliver raced from the room. I laughed and it echoed down the hall after him. I could hear Ellie giggle next to me.

“He looked like he saw a ghost.” Ellie laughed. “You’re very pretty Emma. How come you haven’t shown yourself to me like that before?”

_“It is because it’s very hard for me to appear whole like this. It takes a lot of energy that I have to gather from things around me in order for it to work. Thank you Ellie, you’re very pretty too. It’s nice to have someone to talk to that can actually hear me.”_

“How long ago did you die Emma?”

_“I died 30 years ago right here in this hospital.”_

“Why haven’t you left?” Eleanor wondered. I could feel my apparition growing dimmer. I tried to stay as whole as possible for as long as I could.

_“I haven’t left because I can’t leave. I don’t know why I can’t…believe me I’ve tried. But it’s not so bad here Ellie. Especially when there’s nice children like you around.”_

“You have a funny accent Emma. Where are you from?” Eleanor was full of questions today. Usually we talked about her day and the tests they put her through that day. But never have we talked about my past.

_“I’m from London. Do you know where that this Ellie?”_

“Yes I know where London is. It’s in England right? We learned about it in school the other day. It sounds lovely.”

_“Yes, London is in England. It is a very lovely place. You should go see London someday Ellie. Promise me you’ll go to London when you get better. Okay?”_

“Okay Emma. My momma said when I get out of the hospital that she’ll take me any place I want. I’m going to tell her I want to go to London.” Eleanor said. “Emma, how did you die? You told Dr. Campbell that he did it; is that true?”

 _“Yes Ellie it’s true. I knew Dr. Campbell when we were teenagers. I loved him and he loved me. But then he started to change. He was angry more often and more easily. I confronted him one day and he snapped. We were in the kitchen helping with dinner for some of the other kids. I bumped into him and when he looked at me, all I saw was anger. Oliver grabbed a knife and stabbed me in the heart. The last thing I saw was his face. I think the reason that I haven’t been able to leave here is because I’m still searching for answers. For the truth on why Oliver killed me. Now that he knows I’m here…maybe I’ll finally get those answers.”_ By this time my apparition had faded completely. But that didn’t frighten Eleanor at all. She was used to hearing my voice but not being able to see me.

“I hope you get the answers you’re looking for Emma. No one deserves to be stuck here forever. This is not a happy place at all. I hate it here Emma.” Eleanor cried, wiping the tears from her cheeks.

I touched Eleanor’s hand lightly. _“I know you hate it here Ellie. This place isn’t always sad though. There are happy times at Placid Hills as well. Babies are born, diseases are cured and people recover. Why does no one come to visit you?"_

“I don’t have anyone to visit me. My momma and daddy are in heaven waiting for my brother to get home from war.” Eleanor replied sadly.

_“I-I don’t understand Ellie. You told me your momma said she’d take you anywhere you wanted to go once you got better. Sweetheart I don’t understand what’s going on.”_

“It’s still true Emma. My momma is always with me wherever I go. In here.” She pointed to her heart. “I have an older brother. His name was Andrew and he was 18 when he was drafted in the army. He went to war a few days after I was diagnosed with a brain tumor. I used to get letters from him all the time…but then they stopped coming. I thought that they just got lost in the mail.

“It was Christmas Eve by the time I got the next letter. But it wasn’t what I was hoping for. It was a letter that Andrew had written months before, when he first got deployed. The letter wrote of how much he missed me. It wrote of how Andrew was thinking of me every night and was counting down the days until he was able to come home and be with me again. It wrote of how if I was reading it…that Andrew had been killed in battle, that he wasn’t coming home, and that it was his last goodbye. He told me to never give up hope; to never stop fighting to get better. But without Andrew I have nothing left to fight for. Momma died from a broken heart after Andrew’s death; took her own life with his old hunting rifle in his bed at home.” Eleanor stopped to brush away the tears that fell from her eyes.

“Then once my momma was gone, daddy didn’t have anyone to control his drinking or anyone to lie next to him at night. He drank himself to death last week. Dr. Campbell found him at the front doors of the hospital in the middle of the night. I was lying in bed unable to sleep when I heard a commotion outside. I pressed my face against the glass and looked down at the ground. That’s when I saw Dr. Campbell standing over my daddy as they covered him with a sheet. I locked myself in the bathroom and cried for days.” Eleanor said. If ghosts could cry, I’m sure I would’ve been bawling by now.

_“So it was you I heard that night. I was wandering the halls and heard a scream. It wasn’t a scream of fear or terror, but one of immense sadness and heartbreak. Then I heard mournful wails and thought it was another spirit like me, so I went looking for one. I never found it because it wasn’t a spirit…it was you Eleanor. I’m so sorry. I should’ve been there for you.”_

“It’s okay Emma, you didn’t know. I’m fine now. I know that my family will be whole again one day and I’ll get to see Andrew again.” Eleanor replied. She coughed loudly, each cough racking her small body.

I jerked my hand away quickly, fearing that I was the cause of the coughing fit. Eleanor was overcome with coughing for almost five minutes before a nurse came rushing in to check on her.

“Are you okay Ms. Eleanor?” The nurse asked as she checked Eleanor’s vital signs.

“I am okay now. Thank you.” Eleanor said. The nurse stayed for a few moments more before turning on her heel and exiting the room.

 _“Are you sure you are okay Ellie? You’ve never coughed like that before.”_ I pondered.

“I’m sure Emma. I think I’m coming down with a cold is all. I’ll be fine in a few days.” Eleanor reassured. I waited until Eleanor fell asleep before I left her room. I told myself that she would be fine.


End file.
